


Living A Perfect Lie

by PrussianBlueAye



Category: Terminator (Movies), Terminator Salvation (2009)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Existential Angst, Falling In Love, Feelings, Forbidden Love, Implied/Referenced Cheating, Implied/Referenced Sex, M/M, Morally Ambiguous Character, Mutual Pining, One Shot, Post-Canon Fix-It, Secret Relationship, Self-Reflection, Sexual Tension, Sorry Not Sorry, Survivor Guilt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-24
Updated: 2020-09-24
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:07:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26634847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PrussianBlueAye/pseuds/PrussianBlueAye
Summary: A moment inside the mind of Marcus Wright as he ponders his illicit relationship with John Connor and the stark contrast between the public image of the man, and the fucked-up, irresistibly damaged reality that only he knows and lo-  ...That only he knows.
Relationships: Blair Williams/Marcus Wright, John Connor/Marcus Wright, Kate Brewster/John Connor
Comments: 3
Kudos: 11





	Living A Perfect Lie

Marcus stands at ease, his hands clasped behind his back, and watches along with the others. 

Watches Connor perform.

They're in Utah. It's the last leg of a long tour, an exhausting, gruelling tour - a bullshit PR stunt, as Connor called it bitterly one night a few weeks ago, weary and bone-tired as they sat huddled in his cramped office back home in California, unwinding a little over a rare glass of whiskey. Real, good whiskey, black-market stuff, given to him by some grateful general what seemed like a lifetime ago. The man was probably on the sub when it went down. Or up. Connor said he wasn't sure. Didn't really care. Marcus remembers him shrugging, remembers him throwing his head back to drain the last of the whiskey in one big gulp. Remembers his pale, exposed throat and his tired, distant eyes.

Anyway.

Connor's up on a platform erected at one end of the hangar, facing about five hundred troops. The space is cavernous, with the feel of an arena, a stadium. But Connor's talking to them like they're sitting across a table from each other. There's a strange intimacy to it; it's a wonder how he manages to engage so large a crowd with so little. 

And they're lapping it up, hanging on his every word. Marcus can feel it, can sense it from the energy in the air. These people believe in him, trust him, beyond a shadow of a doubt. It's not bullshit, and it's not just PR, he thinks to himself. These men and women would follow Connor into the very gates of Hell itself. It's a powerful thing, a very real fact.

Next to him, Blair leans in, her hair tickling his ear. "He was born for this," she whispers, "Look at him - they fucking love him." 

And Marcus nods, not taking his eyes off Connor. They do love him, he thinks. But the more he thinks about it, the more Blair's words bother him. 

_He was born for this_. 

Maybe.

But it's not all he is. It's just a facet, just one, thin dimension of the man. He's not just a figurehead, a soldier. A symbol. He's a man, goddamn it. It's not fair that they reduce him to this, and nothing else.

What else could he have been born for? What else did he want out of life? Did anyone ever think to ask him? No. He was born, apparently, to fulfill some goddamn destiny, some prophecy.

It's a fucked-up moment to choose to relive it, but suddenly, all Marcus can think of is that night. That night months ago in the med-bay, not long after he woke up. When he lay in a hospital bed, his body still mending itself and his mind reeling from the implications of not being dead - _yet again_. Reeling from the realization that life as a reviled, sub-human, hollowed-out shadow of a man was now his lot. When he couldn't sleep for days on end, and it turned out, neither could Connor - a fact he became privy to that one night when finally, Connor stole quietly into his room in the early hours of the morning...

The thought of the things that happened - the things they did - that night makes his skin go warm, his pulse pick up. Even here, standing here in this packed hangar, surrounded by his fellow soldiers and with Blair at his side, the memory of it makes his mouth dry and his knees weak.

Of course, it only happened that one time. There wasn't any possibility of it happening again. It was too insane, too risky... Later, the single time they actually addressed it, they'd both treated it as a sort of... shared temporary insanity, if you like. 

In the months since, it's Blair who's taken to coming by his room instead. Blair, whose advances he hasn't really done much to reject. Utterly passive, he let her slip into his bed, and into his life. Allowing events to move forward entirely propelled by a momentum all their own, with no input or effort from him. It isn't just that it's convenient, though. He likes Blair. Blair is a friend. More than anything, he needed a friend. It was an added bonus, to his mind, that she was someone to hold, make love to. Feel human with. 

When he woke up, this was one of the many dark thoughts circling in his head; that no one would ever fuck him again. Connor was a surprise, but in some ways, on some fucked-up level, he made sense. But Blair - she's too good for him, too pure. So it still blows his mind that, even after what he's become, she continues to want to sleep with him. His gratitude is probably a little pathetic. 

He's been doing a good job, he realises, of fooling himself along with them all. 

All these months, he's been playing a part of his own. The dutiful soldier. The good guy. The attentive boyfriend. (He cares about her, he really does. But maybe it's that edge of guilt, sharp and keen in his gut, that makes him extra tuned-in, always aware of her needs).

He's been living a lie. A necessary one, maybe, but a lie all the same.

And watching Connor up there, watching him live out his own lie - his legendary persona - in front of this crowd of hundreds, now makes him oddly angry. Resentful. Not _of_ John, but _for_ him. For both of them, maybe. 

This isn't all there is to him. 

These people don't know him. 

They whisper his name, invoke it like that of a deity. But he's no saint. He's just a man. And a deeply flawed one at that.

Do they have any idea who the man behind the reassuring words and the deep, piercing eyes really is? Do they know what he wants - secretly, desperately, deep down inside - in the parts of him he hides even from himself? Do they know the weight of the burdens he carries? The depths of depravity he's capable of? 

Marcus does. He knows.

He knows how much John hates this part he has to play; the saviour he had to pretend to be. He knows how much the political posturing of leadership rankles at him, and how he'd rather be out fighting on the front lines any day than sitting in conference rooms brokering alliances and partnerships he can't fully trust.

And of course, there are other things Marcus knows. Secret, unspeakable things.

Like how John longs for the metal - a blasphemy in their world if ever there was one. He knows it all too well, and - with the exception of the first moment that Connor suggested it - it doesn't bother him. 

He knows how John craves something that's beyond simple pleasure - something darker, something tinged with pain and ugliness, because it's more relatable. A more accurate reflection of their world. And he accepts it because he recognizes that need in himself too. 

He knows how desperately John cherishes the stable, loving intimacy that his marriage provides him, even as he struggles with his need for something beyond it. He knows the pain it causes him to look into the eyes of the wife he loves and treasures above all else, and live with the knowledge that he has betrayed her. (And probably will betray her again, truth be told. They've been good all these months. But honestly, lately Marcus has felt his resolve fraying. And he knows he's not alone. He sees it in Connor's eyes, feels it in the weight of his gaze on his skin. It's only a matter of time, he thinks...)

Marcus knows these things, knows all of it, and still he falls into rank behind Connor every single day. Obeys his every command, his every order. 

He knows, and if anything, instead of diminishing Connor in his eyes, it makes him more. More real, more human. 

Maybe, Marcus dares to think, maybe it even makes him... love him. 

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, I know this movie is over a decade old and almost no one will still be into this. But, even if the movie wasn't exactly Schindler's List, something about these characters was compelling to me. I always enjoyed the chemistry between Connor and Marcus. There was just so much potential in their all-too-brief interaction on screen - potential for something real and dark and messy. So, I figured, why the hell not. What can I say - I can't resist beautiful, damaged men.  
> SorryNotSorry.


End file.
